Posts Tagged With: onions

I’m turning 30 on Friday, but this post is about a much more famous birthday.

All you foodie folks probably know that Julia Child, if she were still alive today, would be one of those 100-year-old ladies that Willard Scott always used to introduce on the Today show.

(Does he still do that? Is he even still on the show? I haven’t watched in a decade or two…)

What amazes me about Julia Child?

She wasn’t French, and yet she brought French cooking to America before people could just plop down at a keyboard and Google recipes for beef bourguigneon or ratatouille.

She got people excited about cooking outside their comfort zone.

And she wasn’t pretentious or snooty about French cuisine–her vision was that everyday people could use everyday ingredients to make delicious food. She was down-to-earth, funny, and so charming.

I can’t say Julia’s been a direct influence on my life as a cook, because I don’t own a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking (though I’ve adapted a recipe from it at least once) and honestly am not sure I’ve ever seen a full episode of her show.

But she has influenced my cooking–and your cooking and everyone else’s cooking–the same way the Beatles forever changed the face of pop music.

Rock and pop bands today, whether they enjoy the Beatles’ music or not (or, for that matter, whether they’ve ever heard of the Beatles or not) have been influenced by Fab Four. Music today is different, and better, because the Beatles existed.

And cooking nowadays is different, and better, because of Julia.

Now, the ratatouille.

Two weeks ago, I was headed to my good friend Amy’s house for a cookout. Her husband was grilling cornish hens, another friend was bringing bread, dessert was covered, and I was supposed to bring some sort of vegetable.

I had only been back from Portland for a couple of days at this point, and Micah and I had picked up a few things from Daily Groceries, but we didn’t have a lot of any one vegetable. That made it kind of hard for me to come up with any single side dish.

What did we have? Garlic, an onion, a few tomatoes. One eggplant. A huge summer squash. Three bell peppers.

Ratatouille, it turned out, was not just a practical solution for combining all those yummy summer vegetables. It was also delicious, and a natural complement to Trey’s perfectly grilled little chickens.

What did I change? I cooked the vegetables slightly out of order and all together instead of in batches to make this a super-easy one-pot dish. And I seasoned my ratatouille differently from how Julia wanted me to, because I didn’t have any parsley but did have some other stuff that seemed like it would work.

I don’t know how my results compared with Julia’s vision, but this ratatouille was darn good.

What’s in it:

4 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium eggplant, about 3/4 pound, peeled and diced (salt it and let it sit for ~20 minutes while you prep the other veggies)

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 large onion, about 3/4 pound, chopped

1 large summer squash, about 3/4 pound, sliced

3 bell peppers, seeded and chopped

3-4 medium tomatoes, about 1-1/2 pounds, diced

1/2 teaspoon lemon zest

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram

2 teaspoons dried tarragon

salt and pepper to taste

Step-by-step:

Heat the oil in your biggest skillet over medium heat.

When the oil is hot, add the onions and garlic and cook for 4-5 minutes or until they start to become translucent.

Stir in the bell pepper and squash and saute for another 4-5 minutes.

Drain off any water your salted eggplant has released and add the eggplant to the pan. Cook for 5 more minutes.

Finally, add your tomatoes, lemon zest, and herbs.

At this point, your ratatouille might look a little dry, not stew-y and delicious. Don’t add water or chicken stock–just let it cook for at least 30 minutes. The vegetables will release plenty of liquid, and you’ll end up with a savory, hearty pot of stew that you can easily sop up with a warm slice of homemade bread.

Season to your liking with salt and pepper, and enjoy!

The best thing about ratatouille is that it can be enjoyed in so many different ways.

The night I made the ratatouille, we ate it as a side dish with those aforementioned cornish hens.

The next day, I used the leftovers as a salsa for brunch of leftover steak frites and eggs:

And I made a second batch at the end of last week, which we ate as an entree. First over some steamed brown rice (which was kind of bland) and then over polenta (oh, my goodness! highly recommended!).

The last of the ratatouille and polenta was also my lunch today, chosen over several other lunch options because, of course, I wanted to commemorate the Julia who inspired it. 🙂

When we got the andouille links out of the freezer a few days ago to thaw, we thought we might grill them last night with…well, something. We didn’t really have a plan (when do we ever?), but we were sure we could come up with some wonderful meal using those smoky, savory Cajun sausages.

We considered defrosting a pound of shrimp to make a jambalaya, but Micah didn’t really feel like beheading and shelling and deveining a bunch of shellfish last night.

We always get our shrimp with the heads on them so we can freeze the shells and noggins for stock. When we’re really lucky (as we were a couple of weeks ago), we’re able to get fresh Georgia shrimp from Athens Locally Grown or Fook’s Foods for just $5-6 a pound. It’s pretty amazing stuff!

What we ended up making was still pretty similar to traditional jambalaya in the veggies and seasonings–just a little different in the technique, since we winged it instead of following a nice, straightforward recipe like the one I linked above. 🙂

In any case, the resulting dinner was rich, spicy, and full of flavor, with the added bonus of leftovers for lunch today!

not only did the fresh veggies make this taste extra good, but thegreen and yellow peppers looked lovely with those bright red tomatoes!

Add the sausage links and cook for about 6-8 minutes per side, turning frequently to keep them from burning.

Remove the cooked links to a cutting board to rest.

Pour a tad more oil into your skillet if you need to. Add the garlic, onion, and peppers, and saute for about 5-6 minutes or until they’re starting to soften and brown.

Add the tomatoes and tomato paste and stir until incorporated.

Pour in the white wine, scraping with your spoon or spatula to get all the stuck bits from the bottom of the pan.

Add the chicken stock and smoked paprika.

While the contents of your skillet heat back up, cut your sausage links lengthwise and then slice into half-moons. Or, you can slice the whole link thinly on the bias. Add the cut-up sausage to your skillet.

Let this simmer on the stove for a while. (I had a meeting last night and was gone for almost two hours, so we just let ours cook on the absolute lowest heat we could while I was gone!)

When your vegetables are super tender and the liquid has thickened into a rich sauce, it’s ready to eat. Season with salt and pepper to your liking, and feel free to sprinkle in some cayenne for an extra kick.

We spooned this over bowls of steamed white rice (long-grain basmati, specifically, because that’s what we had in the pantry), but Micah suggested it would be fantastic over grits or polenta, and I’d also bet it would be tasty with mashed potatoes or pasta. So, in the spirit of winging it (like we always seem to), serve this with your carb of choice.

And don’t forget to finish the rest of that bottle of white wine while you’re at it.

My mom says I’m the only person she knows who would blindly try out new recipes for my best friend’s bridal shower.

Mom also said I was the only person she knew who would attack her own wedding dress with scissors and a needle to make last-minute adjustments the week before the big day.

Apparently, I’ve got a thing for high-stakes wedding roulette. And the odds, so far, have been ever in my favor, as both my dress and the food for Jessica’s shower turned out pretty darn good.

My goal in altering my wedding dress was to pare down the extravagance. Originally, the gorgeous gown had boasted a glamorous, but cumbersome, cathedral train. Our wedding was much too informal for this fanciness, so I gathered up the dress and gauzy overlay, snipped off a boatload of extra fabric, and created my own permanent bustle to make the train a short sweep instead.

Not perfectly professional-looking, but pretty (and much easier to dance in).

Planning the food for Jessica was kind of the same. Her one request for the shower (not to mention for the wedding in the mountains this weekend) was a batch of my pimiento cheese, which she loves, so of course I had to oblige. 🙂

And once I knew I was making that Southern staple, the tone was set for the rest of the menu. My goal was to serve the kinds of things you’d expect to see at a rural Georgia wedding shower, but with some unexpected twists here and there. I didn’t want to be snooty or pretentious, so I tried to keep it simple.

French onion dip from scratch? But everyone knows that French onion dip is made with a tub of sour cream and a packet of Lipton’s soup mix!

The thing is, I don’t keep either of those things around my house…and I kind of wanted to tackle the challenge of creating this processed potluck party item using real ingredients. A web search provided several recipes to use as models, and my finished dip most closely followed this one from The Craving Chronicles.

Check out my mom's fancy-schmancy chip bowl! And my cute labels.

What’s in it:

2 tablespoons butter

2 large onions, finely chopped (I used one yellow and one red)

1 clove garlic, minced

1 teaspoon salt

4 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

1-1/2 to 2 cups fat-free Greek yogurt

Step-by-step:

Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat.

Add the onions, garlic, and salt, and cook until the onions are nice and golden brown.

Remove the skillet from the heat and stir in the Worcestershire sauce.

Allow the onion mixture to cool.

Stir the onion mixture into the Greek yogurt and refrigerate until you are ready to serve. (I think keeping mine in the fridge overnight really helped the flavors mesh!)

Serve with some thick, ridged potato chips (perfect for picking up chunky dip without breaking).

Yield: about 2-1/2 to 3 cups

The verdict: Wow! I enjoy the sour cream + powdered Lipton variety, too, and this wasn’t quite the same (as at least one of Jessica’s family members pointed out), but the flavor was rich, salty, creamy, and tangy, just as I hoped it would be.

* * * * *

Another made-from-a-mix store-bought staple is the sausage ball, traditionally made with breakfast sausage, Bisquik, and cheese. I had some yummy, spicy sausage in the freezer from Moonshine Meats, but Bisquik is another convenience item that I’m too stubborn to keep around. You can make your own Bisquik, but I ran out of flour after making the biscuits and the cake (recipes coming up shortly!). So, I decided to basically follow this recipe, but substitute cornmeal for the flour.

Sausage balls!

What’s in it:

1-1/4 cup cornmeal

1/2 tablespoon brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 cup butter or bacon/sausage grease (I had leftover sausage grease in the fridge, so that’s what I used)

1 pound spicy breakfast sausage

4 ounces shredded sharp white cheddar

Step-by-step:

Preheat your oven to 425°F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper (or spray with cooking spray).

Use a pastry blender, fork, or food processor to incorporate the butter/grease until your mixture looks coarse and kind of crumbly.

Mix in the sausage and shredded cheddar. (You’ll probably need to use your fingers!)

Pull off 1″ round balls of dough, roll between your palms, and place on the baking pan in a single layer.

Bake for about 15-20 minutes or until your sausage balls are nicely browned.

Yield: about 4 dozen

The verdict: These were super spicy, but delicious! I didn’t miss the Bisquik flavor at all and got a lot of compliments, especially from my mom and Jessica’s Granny Cilla. (And if Granny Cilla’s happy, everyone’s happy! :)) You could easily cut down the spice by using mild or medium sausage instead of hot.

Bonus: Using cornmeal instead of flour made these almost taste like a hush puppy, one of my very favorite Southern sides.

* * * * *

Now y’all know how much I love biscuits, right? Well, I knew that regular-sized biscuits wouldn’t be the right size for a finger-food afternoon shower, but I have a cute little 1-1/2″ round cookie cutter that I thought might make perfect bite-sized mini biscuits.

Preheat your oven to 425°F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. (Sounds a lot like the beginning of the sausage balls, huh?)

Put the flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda, brown sugar, and toasted pecans in the bowl of your food processor and pulse once or twice to combine.

Add the butter and process until your mixture is coarse and crumbly. (Deja vu all over again….)

Add the buttermilk and process just until your dough comes together.

Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and gently pat down to a 1/2″ thickness.

Cut out with a biscuit cutter, a lightly floured drinking glass, or, in this case, a cute little cookie cutter.

Arrange biscuits on your baking sheet. Sides touching if you want them soft around the edges, space between if you want crispier edges.

Lightly press together dough scraps to cut the rest of your biscuits out.

Bake for 12-15 minutes or until biscuits are light golden brown.

Serve with butter, jam, or cheese.

Yield: about 3 dozen

The verdict: These little biscuits were adorable and tasty! I served them with FROG jam (fig, raspberry, orange, ginger) at the shower, but Micah and I discovered the next morning that the leftovers were also delicious with butter (because, let’s face it, what isn’t delicious with butter?) and with pimiento cheese.

* * * * *

Of course, a bridal shower isn’t complete without cake. And I really, truly thought about ordering a cake from one of Athens’ own excellent local bakeries. But, glutton for culinary punishment that I am, I decided I had to bake dessert from scratch instead. The recipe had four basic parts: yellow cake, strawberries, pastry cream, and whipped cream. On my way to the shower, I felt pretty confident that the cake would taste good…but I worried a lot about it falling apart. Fortunately, it managed to (mostly) stay together, at least until we cut into it.

See the spare tire around the middle? That's pastry cream and strawberries, just waiting to burst out the seams. A delicious disaster!

For the cake: I followed Crummb’s recipe for The Ultimate Butter Cake, which I doubled to make two 9-inch layers. I also substituted buttermilk for half of the milk in the recipe because I had some that needed using. The resulting cake was just as moist, buttery, and delicious as I hoped it would be!

For the berry filling: I washed, hulled, and sliced about 2 pints of fresh strawberries, sprinkled a little sugar on them, and let them sit for about 30-45 minutes. This got them nice and sweet and juicy.

For the pastry cream: I used a fantastic recipe from Sauce Boss, subbing extra vanilla extract for the balsamic vinegar and throwing in an extra egg yolk for added body.

For the icing: I made vanilla whipped cream by whipping 2 cups heavy cream, 1/4 cup powdered sugar, and a splash of vanilla extract until it was nice and stiff.

All of the components can be made a day ahead, though you might have to re-whip your whipped cream if it sits too long, and you have to make sure you press some plastic wrap into your pastry cream or it’ll form a yucky skin on top.

To assemble:

Make sure all of your finished components are cold! This will keep your pastry cream and whipped cream from running too much and making a drippy mess (which would taste fine, but won’t look too pretty).

Start with one 9″ cake layer. Poke lots of holes in it with a fork or skewer. Why? You’ll see…

Pipe a ring of pastry cream around the edge of the cake. This will help keep your strawberries from sliding out.

Add a generous layer of the macerated strawberries, reserving a few for decorating the top of the cake. Pour all those yummy strawberry juices over the strawberries. The holes you poked a minute ago will soak up all this deliciousness quite nicely.

Top the strawberries with a layer of pastry cream.

Add your other cake layer and smooth a little more pastry cream around the seam, just to help hold things in a little better.

Frost the cake with the whipped cream and decorate with more strawberries.

Yield: one very tall, gooey, delicious cake!

The verdict: this cake took a lot of steps, but the finished product was both beautiful and tasty! The combination of the buttery cake, rich pastry cream, sweet strawberries, and fluffy whipped cream was pretty much perfect. The only downside was that once I started cutting the cake, it pretty well fell apart, mostly because my middle layer was too thick and slippery. If When I make this cake again, I might split each layer into two (for a total of four layers) so that I can fill it with several thin layers of pastry cream and strawberries instead of one thick one. Otherwise, I wouldn’t change a thing!

* * * * *

Jessica has been my best friend since 5th grade–it’ll be 21 years in August!–and I love her dearly. She was the maid of honor at my wedding back in 2009…

Eric, me, Micah, and JessicaJuly 18, 2009

…and I feel so fortunate to be matron of honor at her wedding in just a few days!

Just like with my last-minute alterations, the menu I made for Jessica’s shower wasn’t quite perfect, and if I could do it over again, I might make a few minor changes. But while my cooking is far from professional, with plenty of technical imperfections, the most important thing to me was to pour my heart into making delicious food for someone I love.

A few months back, Micah and I got a craving for meatloaf. We had ground beef, an egg, breadcrumbs, and ketchup–all the stuff I remember grownups putting in and on their meatloaves when I was a kid–but no idea how long or how hot it needed to bake, no idea what proportions to use. So, we decided to consult some experts for their opinions.

The only problem was, instead of finding “the one,” we narrowed it down to two, and we weren’t going to do that whole one-for-the-wedding-and-one-for-the-reception thing.

First, Paula Deen’s recipe. It’s pretty standard, but it called for quick-cooking oats. We only had steel cuts, and I thought those might make for a too-chewy substitution. We did like the addition of canned tomatoes (which seemed like they would add moisture and flavor), and the recipe had heaps of good reviews. (Plus, Paula’s the self-proclaimed goddess of Southern cooking, and this meatloaf called for zero sticks of butter and no deep frying.)

The other contender? Alton Brown’s recipe from Good Eats (which was one of our favorite Food Network shows before we cancelled our cable). Also fairly classic, also well reviewed. Pros: carrots, Worcestershire, hot sauce, and the ease of chopping lots of yummy veggies in the food processor. Cons: Cumin is one of my favorite spices, but I wasn’t sure I wanted it in my sauce (and some of the reviewers were a bit iffy on it as well).

So, we lovingly welcomed into this world Alton and Paula’s meatloaf love child, a sweet little guy with just a bit of a fiery temper. While we did improvise a little (hey, it’s what we do!), this baby’s got Paula’s tomatoes, Alton’s carrots, and hopefully a good shot at inheriting both celebrichefs’ fortunes one day.

This is now our go-to meatloaf recipe, which we spiced up for supper tonight with pork sausage in place of some of the ground beef and a little more hot sauce in the glaze. We enjoyed this yummy stuff with the last of those leftover butterbeans and some collards:

What’s in it (the loaf):

1 pound ground beef

1 pound ground pork or mild pork sausage

1 large carrot

1/2 medium onion

3 cloves garlic

2/3 cup dry bread crumbs

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1-1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground cayenne

1 teaspoon dried thyme

1 cup canned tomatoes

1 egg, lightly beaten

What’s in it (the ketchupy glaze):

1/3 cup ketchup

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon hot sauce (or less, if you want a not-so-spicy loaf)

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1 teaspoon dry mustard

Step-by-step:

Preheat your oven to 375°F.

Put the ground beef and pork sausage in a big bowl.

Finely chop the carrot, onion, and garlic (or let your food processor do it for you like I do–thanks, Alton!). Add these to the bowl.

Add the breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, cayenne, thyme, tomatoes, and egg.

Roll up your sleeves and get to mixin’! Combine everything thoroughly, but don’t smoosh the meat too much.

Transfer the meat to a 9″x13″ baking dish and mold it into a loaf-shaped mound.

Wash your hands! 🙂

Mix together the sauce ingredients and spread that out on top of your loaf.

Bake for about an hour, cool for a few minutes, slice, and enjoy! (It’s even better if you drizzle some of those yummy pan drippings over the top.)

We were meatloaf-challenged a few months ago, but now we’ve got a recipe we can count on. (Tonight’s was the best batch yet!)

A perfect storm. Micah had just brewed up a giant batch of beef stock, we had two very large onions in our veggie bowl on the counter, and Micah had a hankerin’ for some French onion soup. I hadn’t made it in a while, but decided to forego searching for a recipe and wing it. Not always the best idea (and I’ve eaten some not-so-great meals as a result!), but this one was a winner.

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Who is this random food blogger, anyway?

I’m a Georgia native (born in Royston, raised in Hartwell, settled in Athens). I live in a 100-year old house with my husband, Micah, and two fluffy cats, Cheesepuff and Magellan. You’ll get to meet them if you keep reading
(and I hope you will!).